For most people, financial health doesn’t depend on how much they earn, but how much they spend.

It’s always good to have a decent sense of where your money is going, but it is especially important to know, really know where it is going when you are facing financial challenges. It’s easy when under stress to spend small amounts of money here and there in ways that do not help you and might hurt you — I’m sometimes amazed to see people, especially younger people, buying $5.00 coffees on a regular basis. That’s a small example, but have you ever held a yard sale, and been surprised that selling the small item here and the small item there ended up giving you a tidy sum earned? The reverse is true, too.